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preciate the results of the Analogical School. only wish to keep the two distinct, and, by keeping them distinct, to make them both work with greater advantage for one common end.

And this distinction is by no means always so easy as it may appear. In the earliest stage of mythological language, all names were no doubt cognomina, rather than nomina, intended for the sun or the moon, the sky or the dawn, the earth or the sea. Every one of these aspects of nature had many names, and it was due to influences which are absolutely beyond the reach of our knowledge, whether one or the other of these cognomina should become a nomen, a new centre of a number of cognomina. This period in the growth of mythology, the settling of nomina and cognomina of the principal deities of a religious or political community has hardly ever been taken into consideration, and yet its influence on the growth and organization of mythology must have been very important.

In Homer Apollon has, no doubt, become a substantive deity. Still Phoebos occurs by himself about nine times in the Iliad, and Phoebos Apollon or Apollon Phoebos are found nearly half as often as Apollon by himself or with his usual epithets of ἑκάεργος, ἀργυρόTOέos, etc. In the Odyssey and the Hymns, Phoebos by himself occurs eleven times, Phoebos Apollon eighteen times, while Apollon by himself or with his usual epithets is found more than twice as often as the two together.

It was therefore quite possible that Apollon and Phoebos should have remained independent deities, nay we may say that to certain poets Phoebos was a

distinct person from Apollon, quite as much as Helios. But in time these two names of Phoebos and Apollon converged so much that to certain minds they presented one idea only, though even then it was always Apollon who was determined by Phoebos, not Phoebos by Apollon.

It is but seldom that we can watch this process of crystallisation in mythology. When we become acquainted with ancient mythology through literary channels that process is mostly finished. One out of many names has become central, while all the rest have clustered round it, as mere mythological epithets.

Dr. Mehlis1 has pointed out how, in the case of Hermes or Hermeias, the name of Argeiphontes, or the two names, Diaktoros Argeiphontes, are still sufficiently independent to allow Greek poets to use them by themselves. But he adds that with the establishment of the dynasty of Zeus, the position of Hermes in the circle of the gods became essentially changed. This period, characterised by the hegemony of Zeus, differed from the pre-homeric time chiefly by the anthropomorphising of all the gods, and the gradual disappearance of their physical meaning. The god of the morning-sun, the true Argeiphontes 2, occupied a very prominent place in the former cult of nature among the Greeks, and was then very closely related to the god of heaven, Zeus. This former preeminence he retained even in the Olympian cult, but his original function became more obscured, and the

1 Hermes, pp. 38, 130.

2 Decharme, Mythologie de la Grèce Ancienne, p. 143, a most thoughtful and useful work.

Olympian Hermes grew as different from his physical prototype as Zeus, the father of gods and men, from the god of the bright sky.

Very little progress has as yet been made in analysing the transition from the physical Aryan mythology to the Olympian mythology 1, as we find it in Homer, and in distinguishing the elements which entered into the final composition of each Olympian god. Each of these gods is surrounded by a number of epithets, but while some of these epithets are adjectives, in the true sense of the word, others seem to have possessed originally a more independent and substantive character, so much so that they can be used by themselves and without what may be called the proper name of the Olympian deity.

And here a new difficulty arises, namely, how to distinguish modern epithets from ancient cognomina. We are told that the Erinyes were called Eumenides and σeμvai beaí, in order to indicate different sides of their character. This may be so, and if we keep true to the principle that the original character of every ancient god and goddess must be physical, the name of Erinyes, i. e. the Dawn-goddesses, alone fulfils that requirement. But when the Erinyes are identified with the 'Apaí, this does not prove that the 'Apaí or imprecations were not originally independent creations of Greek mythology, particularly as even in later times (Soph. Electra 112) Arae and Erinyes are separately invoked. The same applies to the Moirae who, originally quite distinct from the Erinyes, are afterwards

1 See some good remarks on this subject in Some Aspects of Zeus and Apollo Worship, by C. F. Keary; Roy. Soc. of Lit. xii. part 2, 1880.

treated as children of the same mother, and at last mixed up with them so as to become almost indistinguishable.

It may be quite true that the problem here alluded to is one that admits of no quite satisfactory solution, for the simple reason that the period during which the crystallisation of ancient divine names took place is beyond the reach of knowledge and almost of conjecture. Still it is well to remember that every organized mythology has necessarily to pass through such a period, and that in Greece particularly the well-ordered Olympian mythology, such as we find it in Homer, presupposes a more chaotic period. Etymology may in time supply us with a thread enabling us to find our way through the dark chambers of the most ancient mythological labyrinth, and we may even now lay it down as a rule that every name, whether nomen or cognomen, which admits of a physical interpretation is probably the result of an independent creative act, represents in fact an individual mythological concept which for a time, however short, enjoyed an independent existence. Thus in Sanskrit Apâm napât, the son of the waters, is no doubt one of the many names of Agni, fire; but in the beginning it expressed an independent mythological concept, the lightning sprung from the clouds, or the sun emerging from the waters 1, and it retained that independent character for a long time in the sacrificial phraseology of the Brâhmanas.

Sârameya, the son of Saramâ, was in Sanskrit as independent a name as Hermeias in Greek. They both meant originally the same thing, the child of the

1 Rv. I. 22, 6, apẩm nápâtam ávase Savítấram úpa stuhi.

dawn. But while Hermeias became a centre of attraction and a germ which developed into an Olympian deity, the Vedic Sârameya dwindled away into a mere name of a dog. The germ was the same, but the result was totally different.

The Haritas in Sanskrit never became anything but the horses of the sun; in Greek they developed into Charites; in Latin, possibly, into the Fors, Fortuna.

If then we ask the question once more, whether Daphne and Athene, being both originally names of the dawn, were therefore one and the same deity, we should say No. They both sprang from a concept of the dawn, but while one name grew into an Olympian goddess, the other was arrested at an earlier stage of its growth, and remained the name of a heroine, the beloved of Apollo, who like the dawn, vanished before the embraces of the rising sun. Etymologically Athene and Daphne can be traced back to the Vedic Ahanâ and Dahanâ with almost the same certainty with which the Vedic Dyaush-pitar has been identified with Zeus Tarp, Jupiter, and Týr. If there are still philosophers who hold that such coincidences are purely accidental, we must leave them to their own devices. The Copernican system is true, though there are some Fijians left who doubt it. But if for practical purposes we believe that in spectral analysis the same lines prove the existence of the same elements in the sun as well as on the earth, we may rest satisfied with the lesson of Jupiter, such as it is, and feel convinced that, as there was an Aryan language, before a word of Sanskrit, Greek, and Latin had been spoken, there was an Aryan mythology, before there was an Æneid, an Iliad, or a Veda.

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